OUT LIKE A BANSHEE

Manteo, NC -- If Hurricane Earl brought September in like a lion, then tropical storm Nicole took it out like a screaming banshee.

We'd been keeping a wary eye on the storm and the low pressure over the eastern seaboard, yet, it still caught us a bit unawares.

About 8 a.m. yesterday the wind went from zero to 20+ gusts from the south -- right on our stern. Within 30 minutes, the bow had blown too far forward and the anchors that rest on the bowsprit were pounding on the dock. It took both of us to inch the lines in enough get clear of the dock. One of us would pull the line up to make some slack while the other would pull it in on the cleat. Pull, pull, pull, "Ready? GO!" It was inelegant, but it worked -- for the moment and at relatively low winds.

The prevailing wind for the storm would be from the south, the only vulnerable direction in this marina -- and the total opposite of the heavy winds during Earl. The morning preview at 20 knots was a good warning for us that we didn't want the same thing at 40 knots.

The wind kindly backed off, giving us a calm window to get the heck out of dodge, or at least to the outskirts. We bolted to a slip on the other end of the marina that the dockmaster calls the "Sea of Tranquility."

Every 30 minutes or so for the next 24 hours, sometimes more often, I said, "Thank god we moved!"

As evening approached, the wind was gusting in the 30s, and waves were breaking over the dock. Yes, over the dock.

And then it kept blowing, not in gusts, but like a big-ass fan. We thought Earl went on for a long time, but this one, thanks to the series of lows along the East Coast, lasted at least twice as long.

Fortunately the "Sea of Tranquility" turned out to be an accurate title. Cara Mia remained calm and unscathed, yet again, even as other boats were flailing around, some sustaining a good bit of damage.

We are thankful that we safely weathered a big storm in familiar water, yet again.

ON SECOND THOUGHT ...

Now that we've had a few days to ponder weathering a hurricane on the boat, it's time to evaluate how it went.

On the face of it, I realize that riding out a hurricane onboard a boat seems careless, cavalier, stupid. Yeah, but ours was calculated stupidity.

We've been riding out Outer Banks hurricanes on land, and securing our boats at dock, for 15 years. We are in familiar waters and have a good feel for how things will play out. Had we been far afield, our decisions would have been different.

First, let me throw out a retroactive blanket of forgiveness to everyone who didn't call ahead and offer us a place to stay. We stayed on the boat by choice, because a) we wanted to do everything we could to keep the boat safe, and b) we wanted to experience that level of storm, to hear 40-knot wind in the rigging, to see how the boat responded.

We get an A+ for predicting Earl's antics. He stayed offshore and blasted us with steady 40-50 knot winds with gusts up near 70 (we think). No water issues -- no water blowing out or flooding in.

The only thing that caught us unawares was the actual size, and therefore length, of the storm. In a closed-off cabin being tossed around in the clamor of pounding rain, yowling wind and groaning lines, it seemed interminable.

Were our lives in danger? No. Had the hurricane made a sudden change in course, we probably would have stayed ashore and kept watch.

Was the boat in danger? We were on the opposite side of the dock from the heavy wind, protected from derelict boats. The only boat next to us was a power boat, so there was no rigging to worry about. Nothing went wrong, but the wee hour scenarios went something like this:
--What if the pilings give way? That was a clear possibility. In that case, we would have had some serious banging around and likely a lot of damage. Everyone here was worried about the pilings. A large powerboat took one out a few months ago in a minor blow.
--What if the cleat on the dock gives way? Same as above.
--What if the staysail starts unfurling?

WHAT WE DID RIGHT:
--Doubled up all our dock lines
--Removed the jib
--Removed the bimini

WHAT WE'LL DO NEXT TIME:
--If we tie up to a cleat on the dock, check its integrity. Otherwise, we'll fret about it all damn night.
--Remove the dinghy and put it ashore. We didn't have any trouble, just another precaution that seems prudent.
--Remove the staysail. We had no issue other than worrying about it. The time/effort in removing it would have been much less.
--Decide based on the storm if we should remove the main. Several dock walkers thought we were negligent in leaving it on. I noticed they did not come back by to say, "You were right." The main was safe because the prevailing wind direction came right on our nose (which is why we left it).

NOT SURE:
--Dropped two 5-gallon buckets on each side to arrest rocking motion. Jeez, it's impossible to know. We were definitely rolling around.  I now feel a certain kinship with ice cubes in a cocktail shaker.
--Staying on the boat. I wouldn't want to stay onboard in anything above 50 knots.

Finally, we offer a sincere apology to Cara Mia. We should not have been in the Outer Banks during hurricane season. Please forgive us for putting you through that.

BLOW BY BLOW

8:00
The wind has started from the Northeast, quiet and cloudy. We watch with nervous energy.

Midnight
It blows. There's a light steady rain on fiberglass. The boat is rocking and groaning. Every once in a while the boat heaves a big stuttering shiver. I flirt with sleep. It plays hard to get.

1:15
The motion changes, the wind picks up. All the sounds that had made themselves familiar the last three hours have left and sent in a new platoon of noises. The most unsettling of them is a high mew like a kitten, mew mew mew, mew mew mew. Sleep still taunts and runs away leaving me feeling slightly queasy.

1:26
I was roaming around restless and stopped to look out to port. A man was walking down the boardwalk and turned up our dock. He bent his head against the wind and rain. A few minutes later we heard a loud horn blow. Wee hour mysteries.

1:44
Okay, that was a big gust. A loud bang and the trash flew open on its track. Hmm. Getting more queasy.

2:11
I'm seeing what they mean by "bands." Every 10 minutes or so, we get blasted. That damnable cat sound is consistent and annoying. My muscles are getting sore from being thrown about in a washtub.

2:16
This should be the worst of it, the next hour. We talk briefly about the cleat on the dock giving way, then quickly change the subject. Conversation is difficult amidst the cacophony.

2:22
Chip is sleeping. Amazing. I watch. A storm blast wakes him, and the boat shimmies. We turn on the spreader light halfway up the mast and look up through the hatch. The rain is almost horizontal.

2:28
A sudden pelting like gravel thrown on the deck. I jump up to turn on the foredeck light. It looks the same as before. Hail? Not sure.

2:50
We've started to get stripes of quiet, calm. Taunting. But then it comes back with a vengeance. Perhaps we'll be finished soon. I hope. My nerves are frayed.

3:04
We've passed now into what will surely be the final hour. The gusts are so strong, the boat bump-bump-bumps along like it's passing over a wooden bridge. The bigger world out there might know where Earl is but in our isolation we track it by wind direction, still north, and the plummeting barometer, still going at 29.7.

3:15
According to FM radio, Earl will not be passing Nags Head until 8 a.m. Could that be true? We have 5 more hours of this? Really?

4:56
Sure enough. This has not let up. The rain pounds. The wind howls. The boat pitches. I snatch little bits of sleep between bands.

5:01
"We expect winds to continue for several more hours and ease around daybreak." This according to automaton man on VHF weather channel. Bastard. And so we enter the fifth hour.

5:08
We both prowl around restlessly. Minutes ago we were standing three feet apart facing starboard, holding tight as the boat bucked. Two items started flying across shelves, one in front of each of us. We each in unison reached out and grabbed the one nearest us.

5:26
I guess the hours before dawn are always the hardest. We both fret. The water rises. We realize now that if something happens, a line breaks, a piling gives way, there's not much we can do. I question our decision to stay onboard. The water's too high now to get off safely.

5:53
Howling wind. This is the worst, and we're tired, nerves shot, watching the minutes tick by, cringing at every gust. I study the eastern sky, begging the sun to rise. We listen to FM radio to hear human voices. We strain over the noise only to hear them saying schools are closed today. There's some news.

6:30
The sky is brightening. Chip just went on deck to secure the boom. It's still wailing. The power has gone out in Manteo. No more AC.

6:39
The barometer has gone up a smidge. Could we be almost out of the weeds? Woods? Winds?

7:00
No, it's getting worse. The wind is intense, sometimes sounds like a low-flying jet. The rain is pounding. We rocking so severely that I'm seasick. We're suiting up and waiting for the first chance to get off the boat. She has proven herself capable. We need a break.


We left the boat just before 8:00 and huddled in the dockmaster's office with some other wet folks, the wind and rain still howling. McDonald's was the only place open selling hot food, so we got nourishment, coffee at Front Porch and then settled onto a now perfectly still boat for a 5-hour nap.

Cara Mia sustained no damage. I'll review the lists from yesterday once we've had an actual night's sleep.

I like reading my wee hour thoughts. Time will tell which ones will take root.

HURRICANE EARL

A note to my blog readers:

I'll be busy the next few days getting the blog up to date, but didn't want to keep you in suspense about this hurricane. We are tied up at the docks in Manteo, ready to weather it.

What we've done:
--Doubled up all our dock lines
--Removed the jib
--Secured the staysail and main
--Removed the bimini
--Secured the dinghy on the davits
--Dropped two 5-gallon buckets on each side to arrest rocking motion (a new theory we've never tried before. Stay tuned.)

What we'll do tonight during the storm:
--Stay onboard and adjust to changing wind and water levels
--Monitor Channel 9 with all our dockmates in case anyone needs assistance
--Keep an hourly log that will eventually show up here.
--Play cribbage.
--Not sleep much!

What we didn't do:
--Remove the staysail
--Remove the main
--Haul out
These decisions will be evaluated here after the storm.

All told, it's nice to weather our first hurricane in familiar waters with friends all around.

God speed, Earl.

THE POWER OF A BOAT: Heading South Day Five

Great Bridge  36°43.368N | 76°14.751W

I was an art history major for a few semesters in college, until I realized I was as likely to find an art history job as I was to purchase the Mona Lisa. But during that deliciously decadent period, I ate up art history in great heaping spoonfuls. One of the theories I relished for evaluating a piece of art is placing it in its historical context, in the bigger world around it. To understand an artwork completely, according to this theory, it must be judged in its unique place and time, looking at what came before it and how that impacted what came after.

Despite the fact that I blog in real time, I find it much more interesting and compelling to look back at my own story in my historical context and in the bigger world around me, looking at what came before big events in my life and how that impacted what came after. Rarely am I able to recognize the big moments when they're actually happening. Except for sometimes ...

From the moment we made an offer on our new boat, Good Company, in December, it was as if we untied the lines of our lives and moved into the current -- after so many stagnant months of waiting. Her power to move us forward started resonating in our lives before we even got her in the water. The offer, the acceptance, the rare weather window in January for the sea trial, the idyllic commissioning and handoff, from the day our relationship with Good Company began, we've been plowing steadily through calm, deep water.

We closed the deal in January and hoped to bring our new boat from the northern Chesapeake to the Outer Banks in February, but the universe needed to tie up some loose ends first, so in epic fashion, the northern Chesapeake remained frozen solid, locking us out. On March 1st we got a contract on our old boat, Isabella. Yet again, we had an idyllic handoff, and the new owners sailed her away on April 2nd, releasing us from the specter of caring for two boats at once.   

By the time we came to bring Good Company home, our 5-year TO DO list was now reduced to one item: Sell the Wine Shop, an item we've been tilting at since listing the business in September 2008.

We left Great Bridge this morning on a short, easy trek to Coinjock, intending to give ourselves a break after the previous day's 12-hour slog, and excited to finally pass into North Carolina waters. It was apparent as we neared the state line that the weather was not going to give us a break. Chip hailed a northbound sailboat to check conditions.

"It's blowing pretty good, but stay to middle of the channel, and you'll be fine."

"Blowing pretty good" was a steady 37-knots -- straight across the beam -- in a very narrow channel through the shallow water of the Currituck Sound. We've learned that navigating the ICW goes much smoother with both of us on duty. I track our progress on the chart and scan the horizon for the path on ahead, giving Chip verbal directions as he concentrates on maintaining the immediate course.

We were taking the occasional cold spray over the starboard rail, when not 10 miles past the state line, we approached the more sketchy part at the southern tip of the sound that required more navigation finesse. 

That's when my phone rang. I'm not a big phone-answerer, often letting calls roll to voicemail, even when I'm not navigating in a 37-knot blow. But this time I answered.

For the next few minutes, I would say, "hold on a second," shout directions to Chip, then tuck my head back under the dodger so I could hear the voice on the other end. 

It was a broker alerting me that he was emailing me an offer on our business.

Looking back in real time, we can only place that phone call in the context of what came before. We don't yet know how that will impact what comes after.

Until then, we rely on what we do know: Good Company. Good fortune.

And so we continue, homeward bound and hopeful, navigating together through calm, deep waters.

Coinjock  36°20.276N | 75°57.399W

ROCK AND ROLL

We're still in the grips of Rock Hall. It's blowing all right. Straight across our beam accompanied by two foot swells. The motion of the boat makes me wonder how loud music purloined the term "rock and roll."

AND it's cold. The wind chill drops down in the 30s at night.

"We gotta get outta here," we keep repeating. Today it seemed even more urgent as the wear and tear on both us and the boat began to show.

I want to leave so badly, I peeled the tape off the starboard rail in a 30-knot blow, freezing. Chip offered to help, but I excused him from the nasty task and crawled on alone. There's never pictures of the good stuff.

When the boatyard closed we took their truck and puttered around town like two bored teenagers, looking for anything to keep us from our rocky, rolly, noisy home out there.

For a while we huddled in the hospitality room, me sleeping on the couch, Chip watching American Idol. Pitiful.

Good Company is begging us, "Get me outta here!"

 CHESAPEAKE MONITORING
National Highs/Lows
7 day Rock Hall | Weather.com Rock Hall
Chesapeake Wind Forecast
Maryland Tides
Virginia Tides
NOAA Coastal Waters Forecast

THE BIG WAIT

Does it seem like we do a lot of waiting?

That's where we are again. Waiting. Chip's back. We're ready to go (sort of), but the weather calls for high winds the next few days, so we'll lay up in Rock Hall until it passes.

We could have made it across to Annapolis today, but the boatyard had to make a final trip up our mast to fix the light they forgot to fix last time. By the time they came back down, it was too late to start.

In the meantime, we've put ourselves on a system-a-day plan until we get it figured out.

While Chip was gone, I tackled the water heater and AC/heat unit.

Today is the navigation system. Chip brought an adapter to make the GPS talk to the laptop, so we're poring over Nobeltec software and the Garmin GPS -- and their manuals -- attempting to find ourselves and our route easier on the way south.

Our days are filled with packing glands and Y valves, bilge pumps and water filters. One at a time.

I only got through half the toe rails before the weather moved in. I've left the starboard side taped in hopes of getting another coat on before we untie.

The wind blows. And so we look longingly out across the water. And we wait.

STORMY THOUGHTS

About 11:30 last night, I thought, "Well, Mr. Automaton, where's your big-time storm?"

A few minutes later, as I was brushing my teeth I heard something that sounded like a tractor rumbling down the dock. I turned off the water and cocked my head sideways, like a beagle, listening. 

At the same moment I identified the roar as wind, the boat made a sharp heel to starboard, the lines groaning at the shift.

"Really? Zero to 30 in the time it takes to brush my teeth?" I asked.

In answer the starboard rail squished the bumper into a piling with a loud SCREEEEK.

I realized in that moment, that most of my attention had gone toward keeping the boat away from the dock on the port side, to the complete neglect of anything that might push us to starboard, like a 30-knot wind at midnight.

That's when the gusts turned into a steady blow, and my guts turned to jelly.

The rain started pelting on the fiberglass roof. Lightning flashed. The boat started rocking in earnest, bang, bang, banging against the dock lines and screeching on the bumper. It sounded like I was lying beneath the tracks in a busy subway station.

This boat weighs more than 10 tons, and in that moment the whole of it was resting on my shoulders.

It was not the storm that scared me. No, this was much bigger.

This boat has been on the water -- and around the world -- for 10 years. Now in my first week as caretaker, is it doomed to break apart on my watch? Am I actually capable of taking care of a 40-foot boat -- by myself??? Have I finally taken on more than I can manage?

And worse, if I can't manage tied up to a dock, how will I react in the big, wide ocean? Will I even survive? 

I was having an existential crisis with a thunderstorm as the soundtrack.

I called Chip. 

"It's blowing. I don't want to go out there. What if a line breaks? What if I loosen the line and the wind gusts and the boat gets away from me?" I babbled.

He calmly talked me down, or in this case, up.

"It always sounds worse than it is. Just put in some more bumpers if you can't pull it off the piling."

So, I took a deep breath, put on my big girl foulies and went up there. As advertised, it wasn't all THAT bad. It was cold and raining, but it was the foulies that got wet, not me. During the previous week, I had learned how to unwrap the dock line from the cleat part of the way, wait for a little break in the wind, then haul it in before the next gust. And that's what I did, hauling in the port breastline, between gusts inching by little bits away from that starboard piling.

But, just in case, I jammed in one more bumper before going below.

And by morning, I had conquered a few more items on the checklist:

30-knot squall at the dock: CHECK
Existential overreaction at midnight: CHECK

There are never photos of the good stuff.

RHYTHM & BLUE

After my first night alone onboard, I was chatting with a local and mentioned "that storm last night."

"Huh, I didn't even notice," he said.

And that's the kind of storm it was, the kind that passes without notice on land. In a house, with the doors and windows closed, with the heat on, it's easy to sleep in total ignorance of what transpires just beyond the walls. But on the water, a thin piece of floating fiberglass separating me from the wind and water, I live at the whim of nature, unable to shut it out.

I watch the barometer for changes. I check the tides, the wind prediction, the radar. Three times a day, while preparing meals, I turn on my new talk radio: marine radio channel 1, DJed by a cold automaton droning about wind direction and wave height and small craft advisories.

I've settled into the sounds of my boat and the water on her hull. My ears have tuned to the new normal and prick instantly at change, an unexpected bump or a wind shift.

My sleep is at the same time soothed by the roll of water passing by and peppered with alert for the midnight call of my boat needing assistance.

My muscles are sore from constant motion, subtle as it is in this quiet marina.

All my senses are adjusting to a totally unfamiliar world.

Sometimes I peer out the port, 30 yards down the dock, at that other world and ponder lines and crossing them, waves and wind, and what a difference a few yards can make.

WHITE OUT

Chip's Mt. Everest metaphor for our lives seems pretty accurate about now. We're up on Hillary's step, summit in sight. We're freezing and a blizzard's a-coming.

Actually, I mean that in a literal sense. This has been an epic winter with record snow falls north of us -- north where our new boat awaits. As it turns out, we chose the only day in January that we could have managed a sea trial. YAY.

But now that the deal is done, we're Jones-ing to bring the boat here to the Outer Banks, so we can move onboard. What do we get? "Snowmageddon." "February Fury." The boat is covered in about two feet of snow. The water is frozen over again. Sigh.

ICED IN

Parties behind us, time to move on to the sea trial on our new boat.

Or not.

Sailing is all about weather windows, and ours slammed shut, or at least froze up. We'll be in the waiting zone until the water thaws and all the players can orchestrate a convergence on Rock Hall: the current owners from South Carolina; the surveyor from Virginia; and us from North Carolina.

Waiting. We have a lot of experience at that.

So for now, we're back in the little house, watching the weather and trying to remember where we live.

SOUTH INTO THE WIND'S TEETH

Question #1: Chip and Tammy's trip to Wanchese on Isabella was hairy because of:

a. a late start
b. a wrong turn (or a really long, wide one)
c. a big blow
d. running over a giant squid
e. all of the above
f. all of the above except d (and technically e as well)

If you said f, you are correct.

About three hours into the trip, when we were at the R in OUR, things went south. Well, we were TRYING to go south(ish), but there might as well have been a giant squid in our path. The wind had been slowly building all morning, something we knew was coming, but there was that a. and b. problem.

So by the time we got to the R in OUR we had the c. problem. It was blowing a steady 20-25 with much higher gusts. The waves had built to 3-4 feet, and we were under power, very little of it. At the confluence of all those arrows, we were going about as fast as I could walk (on land). If the engine had died, it would have been SO ugly. The channel is about as wide as that red arrow with shallow water on either side, not shallow like 6 feet, shallow like 1-2 feet.

All this was a good reminder of why we love sailing and hate motoring. We were at the total mercy of the engine.

But, frankly, if it hadn't been a wee bit terrifying thinking of all the possible things that could go wrong with the engine, it would have been a hoot. It's a natural thrill to ride the waves, to lean into the wind, to take the occasional spray -- and to watch for sea creatures (we saw dolphins).

But, it was a wee bit terrifying, the engine did not die, we did not run over (or even see) a giant squid, and we made it safely to the boatyard. High fives in the cockpit.

REMINDER:
a. don't be late
b. don't take a wrong turn
c. give a big blow plenty of sea room
d. fear the giant squid
e. all of the above

BILL'S WHITEWATER SCANDAL